When Dreams Come True: Reflections on ‘Social Economy’ in Korea
*Author, Won-soon Park is a prominent civil rights lawyer, civic activist and social innovator. He became Mayor of Seoul in October 2011. First there was triumph of market economies after the fall of the Soviet Union. Then came successive global financial crises that debunked that triumphalism. Now, a new concept is emerging around the notion […]
Will the US Pivot Trigger a New Regional Arms Race?
*Author, Richard A. Bitzinger is Senior Fellow with the Military Transformations Program at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. Formerly with the RAND Corp. and the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, he has been writing on Asian defense and military issues for more than 20 years. Some who […]
Overbalancing: The Folly of Trying to Contain China
*Author, Malcolm Fraser was Prime Minister of Australia from 1975 to 1983. As the US reorients its foreign policy toward Asia, with the attendant redeployment of military assets to the region, fears are spreading that the American pivot is really aimed at containing the rise of China. Former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser warns that […]
Not Backing Down: China Responds to the US Rebalance to Asia
*Author, Wu Xinbo is Professor and Deputy Director, the Center for American Studies, Fudan University, Shanghai. Predictably, the last US presidential election campaign featured the usual competition between candidates over who would be “tougher” on China, a ritual political exercise that is almost always followed by even greater American engagement with China once the new […]
Challenging ASEAN:The US Pivot Through Southeast Asia’s Eyes
*Author, Donald K. Emmerson heads the Southeast Asia Forum in the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center at Stanford University. The US pivot toward Asia has been viewed largely through the lens of American security and economic competition with China. Within that context, writes Donald K. Emmerson, Washington is also deepening its involvement in ASEAN in terms […]
As the World Rebalances in the Asian-Pacific Century, So Must the United States
*Author, Patrick M. Cronin is Senior Advisor and Senior Director, Asia-Pacific Security Program, Center for a New American Security in Washington, D.C. As the world’s center of economic gravity continues to shift to the Asia-Pacific region, the US decision to refocus its foreign policy toward Asia is motivated by both long-term interests and short-term events, […]
Soft Power, Smart Power Or Public Diplomacy? Australia Fumbles
*Author, Alison Broinowski, formerly an Australian diplomat, was Cultural Attaché in the Australian Embassy in Tokyo, and Director of the Australia-Japan Foundation in the 1980s. She is currently researching soft power and public diplomacy as Visiting Fellow at the Australian National University’s Faculty of Asian Studies. As traditional diplomacy is complemented by emerging concepts such […]
South Korea’s Quest for Global Influence
*Author, Philipp Olbrich is a graduate student of Political Science and East Asian Economy and Society at the University of Vienna. David Shim is a postdoctoral research fellow at the Institute of Asian Studies at the German Institute of Global and Area Studies (GIGA), Hamburg, Germany. This article is a revised version of a policy […]
Troubled Waters: Seeking Co-operation Along the Mekong
*Author, Le Dinh Tinh is Deputy Director General of the Institute for Foreign Policy and Strategic Studies, Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam. The views expressed here are his own. Once at the center of a long-running war, the Mekong River Basin is now far from the world’s headline-grabbing conflict zones. But the Mekong, one of the […]
Digital Diplomacy: A New Frontier Of Diplomacy or Simply a Delusion?
*Author, Victoria Esser is Deputy Assistant Secretary for Digital Strategy, US Department of State. In June, the US Department of State held a live global Twitter Q&A with the Under Secretary of State for Public Affairs and Public Diplomacy, Tara Sonenshine. Under Secretary Sonenshine answered questions on issues as diverse as human rights in China, […]